All World Affairs Content

Michael J. Totten's blog Tonight is date night with Shelly so you won’t get a new essay on my shiny new Web site just yet. But here’s a great interview with James Howard Kunstler for you. He writes novels and also the best books about American cities ...

Michael J. Totten's blog No more do I want to hear that Europeans are more sophisticated than Americans. Here’s the latest. BERLIN, July 23 (Reuters) – Almost one in three Germans below the age of 30 believes the U.S. government may have sponsored ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Welcome to the new site. As you can see, I now have a Comments section so you can flail me in public instead of only by email. The site is brand-new so let me know if you see any kinks that need to be ironed out. I spent all ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Here’s a snip from an interview with Christopher Hitchens , just back from Iraq. CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS, VANITY FAIR: Well, I had been there earlier this year in late March, in fact, on the southern border, briefly. And I ...

Michael J. Totten's blog I wonder what backroom pressure led to this . CAIRO – Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said on Saturday Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was the only Israeli politician capable of forging peace between Israel and the ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Bill Whittle : Two of the most malignant and cruel mass murderers, rapists and torturers to ever walk the earth have departed the planet — and the left sneers . [I added this link. -MT] There was a time — I can remember it ...

Michael J. Totten's blog During the Iraq war I raised the eyebrows of some of my friends when I bluntly described the Arabic language TV station Al Jazeera as “enemy propaganda.” Here’s what Iraqi blogger Salam Pax says about Al Jazeera today. I ...

Michael J. Totten's blog I’m a big fan of bringing dictators to justice. And so in principle I should wholeheartedly endorse the new International Criminal Court in the Hague. Some of the conservative arguments against it don’t wash, as Randy Paul ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Norman Geras has already been linked by Andrew Sullivan so he hardly needs any help from me. But in case you missed the plug, I’ll second it . Norman is on the right side in the terror war, and I don’t mean “right” as in ...

Michael J. Totten's blog So many women in Bangladesh are attacked with acid that an Acid Survivor’s Foundation is necessary. From their Web site: Acid attacks have traumatic consequences – physically, psychologically, and socially. Nitric and ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Sometimes the little things are the most telling. Here’s a just-discovered interview with Michael Kelly just before he was killed on assignment in Iraq. Give me a sense of Baghdad as a tourist. Is it different from Amman or ...

Michael J. Totten's blog It looks like the Republican Congress is seriously considering a constitutional ammendment to ban gay marriage forever . I’m in favor of gay marriage for all the usual reasons . I understand that when societies redefine ...

Michael J. Totten's blog What the hell ? She knew her new name might finally stick when she got a phone message recently: “Hi, GoVeg.com. This is your mother. Please call me.” It might sound more than a little odd — but it’s true. A young animal ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Fantasy writer Gene Wolfe taught a writer’s workshop and some of his students complained that he was mean . (This means he didn’t pat them on the head and treat them like grade-schoolers, but actually tried to teach them ...

Michael J. Totten's blog It [having kids] is the reason for marriage. It’s not to affirm the love of two people. I mean, that’s not what marriage is about. Rick Santorum , Republican senator from Pennsylvania I wanted a reminder of that day when we ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Anti-gay marriage activist Stanley Kurtz says of Andrew Sullivan: In my recent piece, I also noted Sullivan’s failure to take up the real challenge of the slippery slope argument as it relates to polyamory. In fact, I don’t ...

Michael J. Totten's blog The United Nations is not Star Trek’s “Federation of Planets.” Okay? The Ba’ath Party was founded by Nazis in Damascus during World War II. And for the month of August the Ba’ath Party is in charge of the UN Security Council. ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Hovig John Heghinian in the Comments section pointed to this article about Michel Aflaq, founder of the Ba’ath Party. It’s not a new article, but it is worth reading anyway since it explains the ideological foundations of ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Sean LaFreniere had a compelling and oddly relevant dream last night. I tried to argue with the villain but he only laughed. I turned the other cheek and he hit it too. Nothing that I did made things better. And throughout ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Joe Katzman writes about what he calls Mogadishu Democrats , Democrats who are trying to look serious about foreign policy but end up posturing instead. Memo to Democrats: kindly get a grip. America was attacked. The public ...

Michael J. Totten's blog James Lileks and Roger L. Simon are kinda sorta in the Arnold Schwarzenegger for Governor of California camp. Of which I have been suspicious. Do we really need more goofball celebrities in charge? I love the Terminator ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Geoff Pynn found this charming photo on Ann Coulter’s Web site . Christopher Hitchens, in a debate with her on Hardball , sums up in a single sentence what’s wrong with her. I’m appalled to see what kind of model citizen you ...

Michael J. Totten's blog John Hawkins at Right-Wing News emailed me and several other left-of-center bloggers and asked for a list of who we think are the 20 worst figures in American history. Last week he posted a list compiled by conservative ...

Michael J. Totten's blog John Hawkins at Right-Wing News polled a list of left-wing bloggers, including myself, and asked us who we thought were the 20 worst figures in American history. I posted my list over the weekend. Now John has posted the ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Sometimes the threat of force works wonders all by itself, so long as the threat is credible. Charles Taylor has feld Liberia into exile in Nigeria. He wasn’t driven out by years of civil war but by a cocked American gun. ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Gerard Van der Leun calls me the “Swiss Army Knife of commentators.” Hey. I think I like that. And it seems I inadvertantly helped Gerard figure out what’s up with Arnold. Arnold, Gerard says, is a bi-liberal . (Notice how we ...

Michael J. Totten's blog James Becker emails and points me to an article by Ronald Bailey in Reason about a universal health insurance plan from the New America Foundation . It looks good to me. In fact, I think it’s the best one I’ve seen. Every ...

Michael J. Totten's blog George Will : Truly conservative Californians — you few know who you are — will vote against the recall to protest its plebiscitary cynicism. Oh, lighten up, Will. Look. I changed my mind about the goofball celebrity thing. ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Randy Paul took the Country Quiz and it told him he is India. Apparently, I’m Canada. You’re Canada! People make fun of you a lot, but they’re stupid because you’ve got a much better life than they do. In fact, they’re ...

Michael J. Totten's blog The Washington Post says Mt. Rainier is far more dangerous than we knew. My first reaction: excellent . Only later did I think yikes . I can see the mountain from my office in Portland. It’s bigger than you think. Shelly and ...

Michael J. Totten's blog The liberal blogger Kevin Drum has a list of who he thinks are interesting conservatives . And the conservative writer Daniel Drezner posts his pick of interesting liberals . Matt Yglesias points out that the people on Kevin ...

Michael J. Totten's blog George Jong emails: I have to admit, I get a little freaked out by the fact that you keep appearing in the comments of all the blogs I read – Kevin Drum , Jeff Jarvis , Roger Simon , etc. It’s like pulling over to three ...

Michael J. Totten's blog We didn’t get a blackout here in the Pacific Northwest, but Shelly and I wanted one. So we went “camping” this weekend at a long narrow lake in a canyon in the central Oregon desert. Proper camping is when you hike at least ...

Michael J. Totten's blog In David Fincher’s nightmarish film Seven , Kevin Spacey plays John Doe, mad Bible man and the creepiest on-screen killer since Hannibal Lector. John hated sinners and he set out to kill seven, one victim for each of the ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Andrew Northrup (aka The Poor Man) has a short succinct post explaining why the US doesn’t need an American Guardian . There are a lot of complaints one might make about the American media – there are a lot of complaints one ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Europeans used to blame Jews when people got sick. That same impulse still thrives on the continent. Howard Fineman in Newsweek: The blame-America attitude gets silly at times. For example, you might have wondered what caused ...

Michael J. Totten's blog The Baathist “resistance” hit the UN headquarters in Baghdad with a truck bomb . The top UN envoy to Iraq was killed. These attacks are not a cry for help. They are committed by Saddam’s goons determined to kill their way ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Via Andrew Northrup I find this nasty little screed about yesterday’s terror attack in Baghdad from Emperor Misha (in his own comments section), who likes to think of himself as an “anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler.” I am not ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Joe Katzman is one of my favorite conservatives in the blogosphere. No. Wait. I shouldn’t put it that way. Joe Katzman is one of the best writers in the blogosphere. How many other Jews after September 11 dedicate every ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Jessica Stern in the New York Times says every problem in Iraq is our fault . Yesterday’s bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad was the latest evidence that America has taken a country that was not a terrorist ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Al Franken easily beats Fox . A federal judge on Friday slammed Fox News’ trademark infringement lawsuit against humorist Al Franken and his publisher Penguin Group and refused to stop the sale of the satirist’s new book that ...

Michael J. Totten's blog A work of fiction. (Note: This is the longest piece I have ever published on this site. If you want a printable version, I think the best option is to copy and paste the text into word processing software and print it from ...

Michael J. Totten's blog I don’t know if we can reconstruct Iraq. I am optimistic, I am hopeful, but I won’t make a fool of myself and say it’s inevitable. When the US decided after so many decades of feet-dragging that it was in the same trench as ...

Michael J. Totten's blog John Hawkins at Right Wing News asked several left-of-center bloggers, including yours truly, to send him a list of who we think are the 20 greatest figures in American history. Rather than invent objective criteria I decided ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Interesting article in the Washington Post about Howard Dean. The challenge for Dean now is to transition from champion of the antiwar, anti-Bush left to electable Democrat without losing his steam and solid liberal base, ...

Michael J. Totten's blog Mark Steyn on why Iraq is not the West Bank : For purposes of comparison, consider two suicide bombings within hours of each other: the Canal Hotel attack in Baghdad, the bus bomb in Jerusalem. The latter was greeted with the ...